High Holidays — Rabbi Adam Lavitt

Melted Down to Our Essence (Erev Yom Kippur 5782)

Three years ago, my husband, Alex, and I had a direct experience of melting down metal, and finding history transformed in that act: It was the fall of 2017, and our wedding date was set. My mom had given me my grandfather’s wedding ring. With my mom’s permission, we decided to melt it down, and combine it with some material from Alex’s family - and from it form two rings, our wedding bands - to represent the way, in marrying each other, we were bringing our families’ stories together.

sermonAdam LavittSeptember 15, 2021forgiveness, transformation, history, Holocaust, High Holidays

Living Poetry: Revaluing Religion (Rosh Hashanah Day 5782)

Today, we return to a collection of powerful metaphors: a Book of Life we yearn to be written in for a year of health and happiness; the shofar (the ram’s horn), which evokes the wails of our foremothers as they confronted unspeakable loss and sought consolation; the gates of prayer that stand open before us, assuring us our heart’s longings might be received at this special time of year. These images point toward truths about life we sense but cannot name.

sermonAdam LavittSeptember 7, 2021High Holidays, Rosh Hashanah, metaphor, religion, poetry, theology, image of God

Choosing Life with a Stranger (Rosh Hashanah Day)

Yesterday I spoke about Rosh Hashanah’s invitation to us, b’charta b’chayyim – to renew our commitment to life, even in the face of the world’s brokenness and our own limitations. But how can ordinary people like you and me make a life-giving choice — when it means doing something out of character for us, something we might never have done or imagined doing before?

Adam LavittSeptember 19, 2020Rosh Hashanah, family stories, Holocaust, High Holidays

Shabbat Shoftim

When we are indifferent towards the suffering of another, anochi, anochi: there is my “self” here and other “selves” separate from my reality, and capacity to care. By contrast, we all know the sense of wholeness that comes from being truly present to another person. This feeling, Kedushat Levi claims, moves us -- if only for a moment -- from the world of separation, into the world of wholeness, and unifies God, makes God echad, one.

Adam LavittAugust 21, 2020compassion, High Holidays, Elul

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